Post by BobWilliston on Apr 28, 2019 1:11:54 GMT -5

ipsedixit . The virtuous things accomplished in the name of religion need to be critiqued to determine how helpful they are.

I don't deny that religious organisations can be altruistic however some of their charitable actions are a form of emotional blackmail and intended to pressure the recipients to convert.Other seemingly virtuous actions actually disempower women and members of minority groups and underneath their charitable facade, they are doing more harm than good.

Talk about blackmail!Atheists on TMB do a good job with this downing people with faith in God as being mentally deficient in some way!

Post by snow on Apr 28, 2019 12:26:02 GMT -5

Of course, there are excuses for the God of the Bible written into the Bible. There were "gaps in His performance" back then as well. So chalk up the ineptitude of God to Him "giving people over to a reprobate mind" so he can remain "all powerful" while human beings who believe in him go off the rails. Always an excuse for God. Endless Apologism.

Weren’t humans created with brains, capabilities of emotion(love), understanding, knowing how they themselves want to be treated etc?

It isn’t an excuse for God! For Pete sake!

It’s just that it gives some people someone to blame for individual’s aberrant behaviors, only in life for themselves.Why do you think people have made laws concerning this? If people can’t discipline their own behavior, then society has its rules and laws. Thus perpetrators have to suffer penalties for their crimes.

That’s evident in God giving Moses the Mosaic law and that’s due to trespassing on one another.

Live lawless, get laws pressed on you! God created that for examples for mankind to use as guidelines to temper the lawless.God did what he could. It’s up to us now to purport loving our neighbors as ourselves!

You know that and I know that, but there are definitely others that don't know that, or know it and just ignore it. Justifying what the OT god does in the OT is another thing I don't understand. If he does immoral horrific acts, then it's up to us to have the integrity to not worship a God that does those kinds of things. But that just takes us in an endless loop of blaming God for the atrocities the Hebrew people brought on their neighbors. I realize it wasn't any God that told them to kill women, men and babies and save the virgin girls. But once again it's not taking responsibility for what you do in life and saying God told us to.

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by snow on Apr 28, 2019 12:43:05 GMT -5

I agree that csa is a problem in all groups of people. I think the possible reason why it's seems worse in religious organizations is because they are supposed to be above that kind of thing, so when csa gets discovered in their ranks people like to point out that these 'holier than thou' organizations are no different. And in most ways they are no different except they are more likely to try and hide it or look the other way. Why? Because they very well know they are supposed to be viewed as more moral and virtuous than those unbelievers or people of a different religion. So in religious organizations there are more reasons to 'save face'. Most secular organizations don't have that burden on them. Child care organizations do I'm sure, but any other really don't see it as saving face and are more likely to report csa than religious organizations. They don't have the same need to appear more moral to the world. In fact, most secular organizations wouldn't see it as moral to not report someone that has committed csa and therefore would be far more willing to report. It's more moral for them to report it, and they have nothing to lose like religious organizations seem to think they have. But what I see as sad is that they don't seem to realize that when they hide, move or don't report csa in their ranks, the rest of the world looks at them in a far worse manner than they would if they were diligent in their reporting. Threatening to excommunicate their members if they expose the group to the law is far worse for their reputation than not reporting it. It is inevitable that someone is going to report it and then you look pretty immoral.

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by sharingtheriches on Apr 28, 2019 13:26:41 GMT -5

Weren’t humans created with brains, capabilities of emotion(love), understanding, knowing how they themselves want to be treated etc?

It isn’t an excuse for God! For Pete sake!

It’s just that it gives some people someone to blame for individual’s aberrant behaviors, only in life for themselves.Why do you think people have made laws concerning this? If people can’t discipline their own behavior, then society has its rules and laws. Thus perpetrators have to suffer penalties for their crimes.

That’s evident in God giving Moses the Mosaic law and that’s due to trespassing on one another.

Live lawless, get laws pressed on you! God created that for examples for mankind to use as guidelines to temper the lawless.God did what he could. It’s up to us now to purport loving our neighbors as ourselves!

You know that and I know that, but there are definitely others that don't know that, or know it and just ignore it. Justifying what the OT god does in the OT is another thing I don't understand. If he does immoral horrific acts, then it's up to us to have the integrity to not worship a God that does those kinds of things. But that just takes us in an endless loop of blaming God for the atrocities the Hebrew people brought on their neighbors. I realize it wasn't any God that told them to kill women, men and babies and save the virgin girls. But once again it's not taking responsibility for what you do in life and saying God told us to.

Right!It’s just the same ole, same ole humans trying to get by with things they know aren’t right.That’s my objections against blaming our God about horrible things. That’s my objections to being called mentally deficit because I believe in God!

It’s all about mankinds’ thoughts, opinions, beliefs, behaviors in the face of suggested moral compasses. It actually comes down to being “individually” answerable to trespassing on our neighbors whether they’re 2 year old or 50 year old or 100 years old.

If one holds others to be answerable to moral compasses whether they get it from books, education or God, then they also are subjected to the same judgments.

Post by joanna on Apr 28, 2019 19:02:55 GMT -5

Admin posted this on another thread ( 2018 worker list) and requested that be the final word there

It's because of who the one and only true God - the creator God - is. His character. He is both perfectly just, and full of grace and mercy.

However it is relevant to place this in a thread about the sexual abuse and rape of children with the 2x2 church and other christian churches.

If you believe in a present god, one who intervenes and with whom you communicate and if this god is "perfectly just, and full of grace and mercy" then why are the children being sexually abused and raped?

Why does your god who you believe is all-powerful and full of mercy and grace allow children to suffer within christian churches?

Post by ipsedixit on Apr 29, 2019 1:40:06 GMT -5

Admin posted this on another thread ( 2018 worker list) and requested that be the final word there

It's because of who the one and only true God - the creator God - is. His character. He is both perfectly just, and full of grace and mercy.

However it is relevant to place this in a thread about the sexual abuse and rape of children with the 2x2 church and other christian churches.

If you believe in a present god, one who intervenes and with whom you communicate and if this god is "perfectly just, and full of grace and mercy" then why are the children being sexually abused and raped?

Why does your god who you believe is all-powerful and full of mercy and grace allow children to suffer within christian churches?

This is a recurring question, with no great answer I'm afraid.

It is also worth considering that we hold equally guilty those people who know about CSA, and do nothing to address it. Do we actually hold God to a lower standard of moral duty than man?

Post by joanna on Apr 29, 2019 4:43:41 GMT -5

It is also worth considering that we hold equally guilty those people who know about CSA, and do nothing to address it. Do we actually hold God to a lower standard of moral duty than man?

I had also considered that and it is more than ironic when the christians who do not trust the workers, expect them to have ethical responses to CSA, yet we can observe these same christians performing somersaults in their vain endeavours to justify the Christian god's failure to intervene.

"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities." - Voltaire

Post by snow on Apr 29, 2019 12:15:31 GMT -5

Admin posted this on another thread ( 2018 worker list) and requested that be the final word there However it is relevant to place this in a thread about the sexual abuse and rape of children with the 2x2 church and other christian churches.

If you believe in a present god, one who intervenes and with whom you communicate and if this god is "perfectly just, and full of grace and mercy" then why are the children being sexually abused and raped?

Why does your god who you believe is all-powerful and full of mercy and grace allow children to suffer within christian churches?

This is a recurring question, with no great answer I'm afraid.

It is also worth considering that we hold equally guilty those people who know about CSA, and do nothing to address it. Do we actually hold God to a lower standard of moral duty than man?

From my experience I would say 'yes'. Theists do hold their God to a lower standard or moral duty than humans. They will come up with any number of justifications of why their god allows children to be sexually molested or abused. Why does God, who is all powerful, get to turn his back on it and humans can't? And, what else can it be if not ignoring it? I don't think there is anyone on here that wouldn't stop it from happening if they had the power to do so. Why does God, who does have the power, get a free pass?

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by matisse on Apr 29, 2019 13:00:52 GMT -5

It is also worth considering that we hold equally guilty those people who know about CSA, and do nothing to address it. Do we actually hold God to a lower standard of moral duty than man?

From my experience I would say 'yes'. Theists do hold their God to a lower standard or moral duty than humans. They will come up with any number of justifications of why their god allows children to be sexually molested or abused. Why does God, who is all powerful, get to turn his back on it and humans can't? And, what else can it be if not ignoring it? I don't think there is anyone on here that wouldn't stop it from happening if they had the power to do so. Why does God, who does have the power, get a free pass?

"He" gets a free pass, IMO, because the obvious alternate explanation for him not intervening when one might expect "Him" to is that "He" actually isn't there...or anywhere.

Post by snow on Apr 29, 2019 13:49:37 GMT -5

From my experience I would say 'yes'. Theists do hold their God to a lower standard or moral duty than humans. They will come up with any number of justifications of why their god allows children to be sexually molested or abused. Why does God, who is all powerful, get to turn his back on it and humans can't? And, what else can it be if not ignoring it? I don't think there is anyone on here that wouldn't stop it from happening if they had the power to do so. Why does God, who does have the power, get a free pass?

"He" gets a free pass, IMO, because the obvious alternate explanation for him not intervening when one might expect "Him" to is that "He" actually isn't there...or anywhere.

Well, the world certainly operates as though there aren't any gods. When something good happens to someone, it's a human that does it. When something bad happens to someone, it's a human that does it. There is zero intervention by any of the Gods we have created over the centuries. I always thought the insurance policies should not be allowed to not insure someone because they were 'acts of god'. Mother Nature maybe ...

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by havejoy on Apr 29, 2019 17:56:33 GMT -5

If you have been out of contact with workers and friends for a long time you could always write a letter to a worker or friend that you knew long ago and express your sadness and disappointment on being made aware of sexual abuse in the "truth."

My problem is with the MANY convention owners, money holders and privileged friends who have known about this problem for years and did not nothing. They made sure their families were aware but not others.

How will convention owner's with businesses look to the "world" if it gets out that they knowingly allowed abusers on their property year after year.

How will it look to your co-workers or boss if they find out you have supported and go to a church that supports and moves abusers around.

How have they claimed to love the souls of their fellow men while allowing the souls of the children to be harmed? Not a very good testimony.

Post by havejoy on Apr 29, 2019 17:59:07 GMT -5

If you have been out of contact with workers and friends for a long time you could always write a letter to a worker or friend that you knew long ago and express your sadness and disappointment on being made aware of sexual abuse in the "truth."

My problem is with the MANY convention owners, money holders and privileged friends who have known about this problem for years and did not nothing. They made sure their families were aware but not others.

How will convention owner's with businesses look to the "world" if it gets out that they knowingly allowed abusers on their property year after year.

How will it look to your co-workers or boss if they find out you have supported and go to a church that supports and moves abusers around.

How have they claimed to love the souls of their fellow men while allowing the souls of the children to be harmed? Not a very good testimony.

One of the,many reason we are no longer apart of this group. We Will not stand for so much covering ups. CSA, money, spiritual abuse.. The list goes on. I have a hard time believing that the system us Christian at all sometimes. Nit saying that some of the people arnt though, its the system.

Post by sunshine on May 2, 2019 2:57:25 GMT -5

CSA is a problem for every worker, convention owner, 2x2 member with meeting in their home and any other ADULT with knowledge of abuse of children by "workers" or "friends."

That includes every ADULT on this board who has the ability to write and speak.

If you dare speak out on this board but have not spoken out about the knowledge you have learned, then you are no different then the "workers" and "friends" you condemn.

It does not matter whether you believe in God or not. This is about human decency.

ummm i haven't seen or heard of any pedophile abuse that hasn't already been taken care of and i am NOT gonna go around with a paranoid attitude questioning everyone as to whether or not they are pedophiles with no proof...pedophiles are pretty sneaky i've heard and can go for decades before being caught....

Post by rational on May 2, 2019 17:36:16 GMT -5

Excusing "God" for the ways in which "he" doesn't show up is the realm of the Bible and its believers.

For me, there is no supernatural entity to "blame" (or praise) for the ways in which human beings behave like human beings.

Strange, it sure seemed like you’ve been blaming God for not doing something.

Not believing in any paranormal being would make it difficult (impossible) to blame god for something any more than you would blame the elves for knocking a plate off the shelf.

In most cases these comments are simply using the various beliefs theists have claimed and asking how they can resolve the resulting contradictions and avoid cognitive dissonance.

A being that is claimed to be all knowing, all powerful, and all loving continues to allow children to be harmed/abused/molested and does nothing. That does not all fit together unless you jump through logical hoops that defy explanation.

Post by rational on May 2, 2019 17:40:47 GMT -5

ipsedixit . The virtuous things accomplished in the name of religion need to be critiqued to determine how helpful they are.

I don't deny that religious organisations can be altruistic however some of their charitable actions are a form of emotional blackmail and intended to pressure the recipients to convert.Other seemingly virtuous actions actually disempower women and members of minority groups and underneath their charitable facade, they are doing more harm than good.

Talk about blackmail!Atheists on TMB do a good job with this downing people with faith in God as being mentally deficient in some way!

I would say that the atheists do a fine job of using the claims made by theists regarding their god and asking the questions that arise from the claims.

Post by sharingtheriches on May 2, 2019 19:29:18 GMT -5

We have an example of an hard heart being hardened to the point God does intervene.

Has anyone thought that God knows the evil hard hearts and he allows them to do their evil hard-hearted deeds until he can stand it no more?

Bible says he suffers long with mankind. It says that God(Jesus) would not that any man should perish.

He feels for the vulnerable, but he lets the evil have their day and they are reserved unto the evil day.

We feel for the children that are abused in any form. Thus we’ve made laws to gird them.

The Bible says laws were made for those who trespass on one another.

The example of Pharoah was horrid in his bestial slavery of the Jews. What had they done to deserve such? They were strangers in a foreign land. But they were “eventually” rescued.

This was allowed by God for two reasons, human wise. Number one was to get the Jews to turn back to God. But it took a while of horrid slavery conditions to get them to call on God.Number two he said he’d made Pharoah what he was so that God’s name would be glorified on the face of the earth.

How many times has God tried to get people’s attention to turn to him? How many different hardships have people gone through without turning to God? He might just be trying to get people’s attention now!

Post by rational on May 2, 2019 21:06:03 GMT -5

How many times has God tried to get people’s attention to turn to him? How many different hardships have people gone through without turning to God? He might just be trying to get people’s attention now!

As to the children? He welcomes them with open arms.

Would your god allow a child to be tortured and killed just to be able to welcome them into his/her arms? That sounds immoral at best.

Post by sharingtheriches on May 2, 2019 21:55:50 GMT -5

How many times has God tried to get people’s attention to turn to him? How many different hardships have people gone through without turning to God? He might just be trying to get people’s attention now!

As to the children? He welcomes them with open arms.

Would your god allow a child to be tortured and killed just to be able to welcome them into his/her arms? That sounds immoral at best.

No, he doesn’t allow. He lets the evil hard hearts do their evil, he’s turned them over to reprobate minds. Lack of consciences. He will exact payment.

The Bible told one group who were being abused, mistreated; that their abusers would one day kneel down before them.

Post by Dennis J on May 3, 2019 0:23:36 GMT -5

If I were wishing to appeal to the prurient in humanity, there is MUCH that could be expressed from my own witness and experience through the years. However I am not, so I do not. The God in whom I trust has expressed “vengeance is mine.” Believing Him, He will make things fair beyond my finite human understanding. Those who neither can, nor will, believe Him, must believe as they do, for they fear lest He is, despite their denials now.

Can i prove that He is for another? Nope. That is a totally individual matter in the present. In that future awareness, the proof of His Being, and existence, will not come as a shock for/to me. Every knee shall bow, every tongue will confess Him. Nor will I, or any other, have any need to express, “I/we told you so.” At that occasion all reading what is expressed here now, will have no doubt, neither, fully remembering these very expressions.

Post by snow on May 3, 2019 12:29:55 GMT -5

Strange, it sure seemed like you’ve been blaming God for not doing something.

Not believing in any paranormal being would make it difficult (impossible) to blame god for something any more than you would blame the elves for knocking a plate off the shelf.

In most cases these comments are simply using the various beliefs theists have claimed and asking how they can resolve the resulting contradictions and avoid cognitive dissonance.

A being that is claimed to be all knowing, all powerful, and all loving continues to allow children to be harmed/abused/molested and does nothing. That does not all fit together unless you jump through logical hoops that defy explanation.

Let the dance begin... Trying to justify God's immorality in the OT makes me feel sorry for theists. They likely would never do what their God does, yet they feel they have to justify it anyway. They don't see how saying that nothing God does is immoral really doesn't make them look very moral either.

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by snow on May 3, 2019 12:33:24 GMT -5

Would your god allow a child to be tortured and killed just to be able to welcome them into his/her arms? That sounds immoral at best.

No, he doesn’t allow. He lets the evil hard hearts do their evil, he’s turned them over to reprobate minds. Lack of consciences. He will exact payment.

The Bible told one group who were being abused, mistreated; that their abusers would one day kneel down before them.

Not preventing something when we have the power to do so, is allowing. I don't see any way of getting around that. It doesn't make any difference that you feel he doesn't allow children to be abused and then state that he does allow the abuser to abuse children.

In the end there will only be three things that matter. How much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of the things not meant for you. The BuddhaMorality comes not from a book, or a guy up in the sky, but from the idea that how you treat people matters, because how people feel matters. Unknown.

Post by sharingtheriches on May 3, 2019 13:25:05 GMT -5

No, he doesn’t allow. He lets the evil hard hearts do their evil, he’s turned them over to reprobate minds. Lack of consciences. He will exact payment.

The Bible told one group who were being abused, mistreated; that their abusers would one day kneel down before them.

Not preventing something when we have the power to do so, is allowing. I don't see any way of getting around that. It doesn't make any difference that you feel he doesn't allow children to be abused and then state that he does allow the abuser to abuse children.

The Bible says God “gives them over” to a reprobate mind.

It’d be hard for him to put the right thoughts and desires in reprobate people. It says he gives them over which can mean he’s through trying to deal with them.

It seems the other thing is that when people are born, their departure date is set also. Can God change that. We know that he did for Hezekiah but there is an exacting if that occurs. Somebody has to pay the orice. In Hezekiah’s situation his heirs paid for Hezekiah’s added 15 yrs. The reprobates live their assigned number of years. Never allowing God’s interventions etc. The only way God could stop them would to be to kill them.Can you make yourself pray for the perps death? It takes a price.So God’s put laws in place that makes the perps pay the price.Why blame God when he’s given us eyes, ears, heart and brain to take care of these things?That’s like setting down and telling God, you go ahead do what needs to be done and Zill just sit here in my Fannie and when you’ve got it done, I’ll rise to play.

Post by rational on May 3, 2019 15:04:21 GMT -5

Would your god allow a child to be tortured and killed just to be able to welcome them into his/her arms? That sounds immoral at best.

No, he doesn’t allow.

It has been and is happening so you really can't say it is not allowed.

He lets the evil hard hearts do their evil, he’s turned them over to reprobate minds.

So he allows the evil people to molest/torture/kill children. The behavior is condoned in every sense of the word.

Lack of consciences.

For whatever reason, the evil behavior is allowed.

He will exact payment.

But in the mean time the children are being molested/tortured/killed. So, can you really say your god would not allow a child to be harmed?

The Bible told one group who were being abused, mistreated; that their abusers would one day kneel down before them.

That is a nice thought but it does not bring a lot of comfort to the child being harmed.

It raises the question among the unbelievers as to whether an entity that allows innocent children to be molested and harmed, and has the power to stop it, should be placed in a position of worship or condemned.

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